Bad Advertisement?
Are you a Christian?
Online Store:Visit Our Store
| That the Symbols of the Trinity in Man, to Be, to Know, and to Will, are Never Thoroughly Examined. PREVIOUS SECTION - NEXT SECTION - HELP
Chapter XI.—That the Symbols of
the Trinity in Man, to Be, to Know, and to Will, are Never
Thoroughly Examined.
12. Which of us understandeth the Almighty
Trinity?1204
1204 As Augustin constantly urges of God, “Cujus
nulla scientia est in anima, nisi scire quomodo eum nesciat”
(De Ord. ii. 18), so we may say of the Trinity. The
objectors to the doctrine sometimes speak as if it were irrational
(Mansel’s Bampton Lectures, lect. vi., notes 9, 10). But
while the doctrine is above reason, it is not
contrary thereto; and, as Dr. Newman observes in his Grammar
of Assent, v. 2 (a book which the student should remember has
been written since his union with the Roman Church), though the
doctrine be mysterious, and, when taken as a whole, transcends all
our experience, there is that on which the spiritual life of the
Christian can repose in its “propositions taken one by one, and
that not in the case of intellectual and thoughtful minds only, but
of all religious minds whatever, in the case of a child or a
peasant as well as of a philosopher.” With the above compare the
words of Leibnitz in his “Discours de la Conformité de la Foi
avec la Raison,” sec. 56: “Il en est de même
des autres mystères, où les esprits modérés trouveront toujours
une explication suffisante pour croire, et jamais autant qu’il en
faut pour comprendre. Il nous suffit d’un certain ce que
c’est (τί
ἐστι); mais le comment (πῶς) nous passe, et
ne nous est point nécessaire” (Euvres de Locke et
Leibnitz). See also p. 175, note 1, above, on the
“incomprehensibility” of eternity. | And yet
which speaketh not of It, if indeed it be It? Rare is that soul
which, while it speaketh of It, knows what it speaketh of. And they
contend and strive, but no one without peace seeth that vision. I
could wish that men would consider these three things that are in
themselves. These three are far other than the Trinity; but I speak
of things in which they may exercise and prove themselves, and feel
how far other they be.1205
1205 While giving illustrations of the Trinity like the
above, he would not have a man think “that he has discovered that
which is above these, Unchangeable.” (See also De Trin.
xv. 5, end.) He is very fond of such illustrations. In his De
Civ. Dei, xi. 26, 27, for example, we have a parallel to this
in our text, in the union of existence, knowledge, and love in man;
in his De Trin. ix. 4, 17, 18, we have mind, knowledge, and
love; ibid. x. 19, memory, understanding, and will; and
ibid. xi. 16, memory, thought, and will. In his De Lib.
Arb. ii. 7, again, we have the doctrine illustrated by the
union of being, life, and knowledge in man. He also finds
illustrations of the doctrine in other created things, as in their
measure, weight, and number (De Trin. xi. 18), and their
existence, figure, and order (De Vera Relig. xiii.). The
nature of these illustrations would at first sight seem to involve
him in the Sabellian heresy, which denied the fulness of the
Godhead to each of the three Persons of the Trinity; but this is
only in appearance. He does not use these illustrations as
presenting anything analogous to the union of the three
Persons in the Godhead, but as dimly illustrative of it. He
declares his belief in the Athanasian doctrine, which, as Dr.
Newman observes (Grammar of Assent, v. 2), “may be said to
be summed up in this very formula on which St. Augustin lays so
much stress,—‘Tres et Unus,’ not merely ‘Unum.’ ”
Nothing can be clearer than his words in his De Civ. Dei,
xi. 24: “When we inquire regarding each singly, it is said that
each is God and Almighty; and when we speak of all together, it is
said that there are not three Gods, nor three Almighties, but one
God Almighty.” Compare with this his De Trin. vii., end of
ch. 11, where the language is equally emphatic. See also Mansel, as
above, lect. vi. and notes 11 and 12. | But the three things I speak of
are, To Be, to Know, and to Will. For I Am, and I Know, and I Will;
I Am Knowing and Willing; and I Know myself to Be and to Will; and
I Will to Be and to Know. In these three, therefore, let him who
can see how inseparable a life there is,—even one life, one mind,
and one essence; finally, how inseparable is the distinction, and
yet a distinction. Surely a man hath it before him; let him look
into himself, and see, and tell me. But
when he discovers and can say anything of
these, let him not then think that he has discovered that which is
above these Unchangeable, which Is unchangeably, and Knows
unchangeably, and Wills unchangeably. And whether on account of
these three there is also, where they are, a Trinity; or whether
these three be in Each, so that the three belong to Each; or
whether both ways at once, wondrously, simply, and vet diversely,
in Itself a limit unto Itself, yet illimitable; whereby It is, and
is known unto Itself, and sufficeth to Itself, unchangeably the
Self-same, by the abundant magnitude of its Unity,—who can
readily conceive? Who in any wise express it? Who in any way rashly
pronounce thereon?
E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
|